


A Wending Heart

by Desseruh



Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: Abandonment, Angst, Character Death, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, Heavy Angst, Miscarriage, Nightmares, Pining, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Harm, Slow Burn, So Many Arguements, Tragedy, Trust Issues, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:15:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26047861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Desseruh/pseuds/Desseruh
Summary: He had left her.The moment she miscarried he shied away and ran.And never came back.
Relationships: Ayame/Kouga (InuYasha), Higurashi Kagome/Kouga, InuYasha/Kikyou (InuYasha)
Comments: 42
Kudos: 138





	1. The House at The Edge of the Village

**Author's Note:**

> Hello and thank you for reading! I just want to warn you that there are depictions of a miscarriage and mental self-harm through-out this fanfiction. 
> 
> If certain things like this disturb you or trigger you, please stay well and do not read!

It was a young summer day. The sweet kind that wasn’t too hot or humid, and the air smelt like new life and fresh air. Village members moved in sublimity, a trace of good fortune lightening their moods and brightening the dirt streets and thatched buildings. Unaware of the quiet misery brooding at the edge of Kaede's Village

Kagome stood in her open doorway, leaned slightly to one side as an empty herb basket made its home in the crook of her arm. A slight frown stippled the edges of her lips and her eyes held a glossy sheen of someone who was holding back tears.

It was a nice day and she wanted to cry. 

It wasn’t a new thing. Most days were like this; when morning came and Inuyasha was still missing. When she would wake up and the phantom memory of blood against her thighs, a sob always climbing her throat. 

And Inuyasha-

The basket was adjusted against her hip and Kagome let herself shudder once, and only once, as she adjusted the sleeves of her kimono and hooked the heavily mended edge around her elbows.

While she had consistently refused to wear the Miko garb, she had taken to some of the duties in the village. With the increasing age of Kaede and the population of the village, it had become… very important that Kagome did things such as herb collecting as arthritis claimed the older woman. 

So every day she would wake up, listless from nightmares and tear shed, and head out. Gathering what she could from the forest before depositing with Kaede and heading back home to repeat the process again the next day. 

And again. 

And again. 

…

It had been well over a year since the defeat of Naraku and, subsequently, the mating between her and Inuyasha. It had been eight months since their… her miscarriage. When all this happened. 

_-the middle of the night. The moon gaping in the sky and stars twinkling serenely beyond a few stray clouds._

_She had woken up in pain. Something deep and gritty from within her pelvic cradle had shifted. Even then, as a human, Kagome could smell the blood and serum as she choked out a-_

When she woke up bleeding. Screaming as she felt her body expel her baby prematurely, her blood coming in rushes. 

The look in Inuyasha’s eyes, his pupil narrowing into these thin pinpricks, as if he was more cat than dog, while his ears pressed visibly against his head. Panic, blood, panic. 

_“Ka-kagome? What?” His eyes sharpened as her body tremored. He didn’t grab her or comfort her, but stood quickly and backed away-_

She had reached for him and he shied away. Shied away from her and ran. And he hadn’t come back. 

It had been eight months and he hadn’t come back. 

Kagome wasn’t sure she… she wasn’t sure what she had felt for the hanyou. Even before the...incident. 

It had become a hard-earned reality check when he looked at her and she was never sure if he was seeing her or Kikyo. When his eye would glaze over and it took him just a second longer to say her name that it should have. It was harsh, it was unkind, but in the end, it had been what she wanted.

What she dreamed of. Streams of denial flooding her up until the mating, the first kiss, and the act in and of itself. The mark she hadn’t had the gull to look at since. 

A misty, rose-tinted idea of love, companionship, and understanding. 

Inuyasha left her the moment she miscarried. 

_-he left out the front door, bounding into the woods-_

And she had been alone ever since. And that's what hurt the most. 

Every day was an awful stretch, a stream of tears always waiting behind the filmy visage of her

And every day she headed out into the forest to gather herbs. Something to make her get up, ignore the phantom bloodstains, and get fresh air. It wasn’t pretty, she wasn’t efficient, but no one questioned her for being gone all day. 

No one really questioned her at all anymore. Adults were busy with their own business and Kagome was too mournful to entertain children like she once did. 

And as Kagome stepped into the forest, she knew today was not going to be the day she tried to connect. If she ever reconnected, that is. 

She hadn’t even reached out to Sango. Kagome wasn’t even sure how to reach out, what she would say or how she would say it. It had been eight months, but every day felt fresh. Every morning waking up alone, baby-bump flattened and a small mound of dirt was her child's new womb. 

Sometimes, she would argue that the reason she never reached out to anyone was that she was afraid of the reaction they may have. But, internally, Kagome couldn’t handle it herself. To acknowledge it beyond the pain herself would make it solid, confirming that her baby was dead even before life. 

And it wasn’t something that she could handle. She still expected to wake up from this, and Inuyasha would be there and she would still be pregnant. And maybe Inuyasha would look at her and not the horizon and every day she wouldn’t feel gutted when she realized everything she had done _was so wrong and stupid._

Kagome would have taken her baby over Inuyasha, but the universe decided to teach her a lesson. 

She shifted again, moving from her doorway in hurried steps as some villagers trailed closer, disliking the idea passerby may judge her for self-anointed crimes. 

The forest itself was nonjudgemental. A place where questioning glances couldn’t follow beyond the gradient of the underbrush. 

Early summer days were musky, the moisture in the soil and the leaf litter retained the sweet smell of rot, but it had yet to get too humid. Young plants pushed through the undergrowth and sought the pale yellow splotched of sunlight that broke through the canopy. 

And for a second, or maybe a little longer, Kagome folded her legs under herself and sat between the roots of an old tree. Staring into nothing. Dreaming of nothing. 

The moments ticked on, the sounds around her shifted and her presence was disregarded by the forest. Mice skittered under ferns, birds swept closer, and she could feel an insect around her ankle. Peaceful. 

It was like meditation, sure, but Kagome would never count it as such. It was just something to distract her. To remind her where she was. 

Finally, Kagome got up. Shakily, her fingers sweeping away bits of foliage from her grass-stained kimono as wet spots lined her legs. The insect on her ankle flew away, and the animals close by fled. 

The quiet sucked her in again, wind and far away birds the only noises as she began to pick new sprigs off of medicinal herbs. 

For hours, Kagome carried on with the same task; foraging, picking, and marking the plant so she wouldn’t pick at it again. She was in the middle of shaving bark from Eucommia when her routine was interrupted by the shuffling of tree branches and the crackle of demon fire. A soft brush of their aura and Kagome knew it was Kirara.

No. No, not like this. Not today. Maybe tomorrow? Yes, tomorrow she would be ready for-

Kirara landed behind her, a soft crunch as massive paws trampled undergrowth flat followed up with the slight smell of wood smoke before being diluted in a summer breeze. Kagome trembled, standing ramrod as the welcoming m-reow that usually heralded Kirara was cut short, shifting upward an octave as if in question. 

And then Kagome couldn’t help it. 

The basket full of herbs, medicinal and otherwise, fell to the ground as bundles of flowers, shavings and stems scattered around it as Kagome turned and threw herself at the giant cat, clamping herself around Kirara’s neck and shoulders. Full-body sobs followed and Kagome knew that the cat was put off by the strange display of emotions, yet they still bowed their great head over her shoulder and let her cry into their fur. 

This was what Kagome was afraid of. The frayed stitches holding her together had split and fell away, leaving her a wreck. Dusty remains of how Kirara last saw her, happily mated with crowns of flowers in her hair, a new house nestled into the woods. Now? 

Kagome’s eyes, blue as they were, were the exact color of mourning. And the smell of sadness was so thick Kirara could taste it on her tongue. 

It frightened the demon cat greatly. Especially when she couldn’t smell Inuyasha on her. Not a trace. 

Kirara had been busy, as Miroku and Sango had been. When not building houses and recruiting members, they had been busy with new slayer business or the fields of crops outlining the village. Then there was Sango, who was so pregnant at this point she wasn’t allowed out of the house. 

The only reason Kirara was even there was to retrieve the couple to stand witness to the birth. 

And for that, Kirara felt very, very guilty. 

And a bit angry, but that wasn’t important while Kagome broke down in front of her. 

“Brreow?” 

Kagome sniffled and shifted so she could lay her head on Kirara’s shoulder, speaking away from the cat. 

“He’s gone.” 

Of course, Kagome couldn’t completely understand the cat demon. But intuition was just as good sometimes. 

Kirara rubbed her head along Kagome’s neck and shoulders, not fully understanding the situation beyond Kagome’s emotional instability and the fact that Inuyasha was missing. 

They stayed like that for a long while, only moving to shift lower to sit on the forest floor when Kagome’s legs began to shake. 

It was only when the sun shifted enough in the sky and the heat index rose did Kirara finally pull away from Kagome, teeth gently gripping the unraveled edge of cotton sleeves. Beckoning her. Urging her to come with. 

Kagome stared at Kirara, then her sleeve, and then in the direction of her house. Her heart and womb ached, emptied and gutted. This wasn’t the end of the nightmare, was it? 

This was real life. Her baby was dead and Inuyasha had abandoned her, and that was fact. She would never wake up from this. 

Her baby was dead. 

Inuyasha had never loved her. 

Her family was five hundred years in the future. 

But her tears were drying, not because she was healing but because there just wasn’t any left to shed. They had left her too, and now she felt light, airy. Her head was misty and her eyes sore. 

“I-I need to bathe first.” Her voice broke and she trembled, but she didn’t try to remove her arm from Kirara. “I can’t- I don’t… I can’t go looking like this. Please.” 

Kirara’s face twisted, but she nodded. She couldn’t allow Kagome to remain here like this and Kirara wanted to get back to her master as soon as possible, but she knew Kagome’s need for hygiene. Perhaps it would make her feel better, perhaps she would calm down. 

Without looking back at the basket and its strewn contents, Kirara was the one to lead the way by pulling Kagome back in the direction of her house.

Unresisted by the Miko, they made good time and arrived back at the shady house in what Kagome called ‘half an hour’. The shadows made the home look less than welcoming, darkening the cloth door in voids of grey and black. 

Kagome looked at it, sullenly, before removing herself from Kirara and trudging through the gaping doorway. She didn’t think she would miss this place, even for a second. It had been so nice to have, so secluded. But now, it was one of those lonely houses people forget exist. 

And Kagome wanted to forget this place and all it stood for. 

Deep in the house, inside a small space used for storing her warmer, winter clothing, sat a dusty yellow backpack. A spiderweb linked it to the wall and a mouse had chewed away the dangling bit of the strap, but there it was. 

Forgotten. 

Kagome grabbed without a second thought, loading it quickly with clothing and her ever withering bathing supplies and toiletries. It wasn’t even half full when she was done, and it hung off her shoulders like a dead animal. 

She would not miss this place. 

_“This is our home, Kagome.” Inuyasha’s hand holding her own. She could feel the lines of calluses where the hilt of his sword laid against it. He was warm, but his eyes were strangely cool despite their amber color._

_And when he kissed her, it was hurried, as they stepped through the front door. His calloused hands sliding between the folds of her dress, feeling her excited skin as the curtain pulled shut behind them-_

When she exited the door, the curtain waved as if saying goodbye before falling still and straight. As if knowing that this was the end of its duty to the miserable woman. 

Kirara greeted her outside, grabbing her sleeve again as if she were afraid Kagome would fade away if she didn’t. 

“Are you mad?” It was so soft that Kirara, demon or not, thought she made it up. Heard it wrong, or someone far away from them said it, but when she looked at Kagome she was met with that sad expression once again. 

So weary, so broken. 

And yes, Kirara was mad. At Inuyasha. 

And at Kagome. Of course, she was angry at Kagome. 

Even without the speed of a half-demon, there were ways to reach out. To get help. Someone who was preg-

...nant… shouldn’t be… alone. 

Kirara stiffened, her feet stalling as she almost tripped forward. 

Kagome had been pregnant. 

She was there when Miroku and Sango had gotten the letter, a few weeks after their own pregnancy was confirmed. 

But Kagome wasn’t pregnant. She didn’t even smell like it. 

Kirara was an old demon, by human standards. She had been around for generations and generations. Child death, before and after birth, wasn’t uncommon. But the commonness of it didn’t take away from the pain it wrought. Even animals, lower than the scope of sentience a demon or a human would have, mourned heavily over the death of offspring. 

“Kirara?”

The cat demon shook her head slightly, trying not to give away her momentary shock and instead hurried up as if she didn’t just realize something horrible. 

In the end, Kagome had gotten on her back and Kirara flew down to the river’s edge. The women had long left the shores from their laundry and the banks were currently abandoned, leaving the Miko and demon alone. 

Kagome walked into the water immediately, not even caring as the cold bit into her legs and belly. The water frothed around her as she disrobed in the waters, Kirara guarding her as she stretched out the stained and disheveled layers of cloth against stones and branches. 

And when every piece of her shitty wardrobe was drying on the shoreline, Kagome worked on herself. Taking time to wash the swollen around her eyes and finger grooming her hair into some fashion other than ‘rats nest’. 

When she was done, she felt only more awake instead of better. 

At the behest of Kirara, who roared from the shoreline, Kagome quickly rinsed off one more time before striding ashore. Her hair, which had grown longer without the regular cuts she had received in her own time, had tapered to her hips. Still reflective like raven wings, but otherwise uncared for: wild along the edges of Kagome shoulder blades and skinny ribs. 

Kirara watched as Kagome dug through her bag, and instead of pulling out another kimono, she pulled out soft grey pants that she pulled up and over her hips quickly. A shirt, short-sleeved and odd compared to the long sleeve she used to wear, came next over her unbound chest. 

Even though the clothing was odd, Kirara thought that she looked more like Kagome, her friend, that the crying stranger she had found in the woods earlier that day. 

“Mrr-ow.” 

“Yeah, yeah, I’m coming.” Kagome packed quickly, pushing the wet clothes inther her sack in quick folds before climbing onto Kirara’s back, settling in the familiar crook after the demon cat’s shoulder blades and hooking her unused bow over her shoulder, muscle memory guiding her. 

Kirara waited until Kagome held on before springing into the air, hoping the out of practice Miko was prepared as she shot into the sky, the smell of fire and new air curing around both of them. Kagome shielded her eyes from the sun as it spilled over the canopy of trees and hit them both, unfamiliar but warm. 

It was unshared, but both Kagome and Kirara knew that they missed this. The excitement of travel and the new landscapes, even if it was going to be for a short time. Her fingers traced the edge of her bow and she could feel the weight of her quiver against her spine. This wasn’t the same, it could never be the same, but it was enough to stop the horrible rush and swell of her misery, if even just a little bit. 

Only a few watched her go. Including Kaede, who finally relaxed in her spot near the front of her house and watched until she couldn’t see them anymore. 

She knew what had happened. Of course, she did. When it happened, she had expected Kagome to reach out, to ask for assistance as many other women had asked her, but to her surprise, Kagome had stayed quiet. She’d stopped wearing the Miko garb, stopped talking to children, and receded into the woods. They’d all assumed she’d grieve and eventually come out. 

But Kagome never did. 

And Kaede, well, she has been busy. Busier than ever, actually, as the village grew and the residence doubled in numbers. It made the days shorter, and time seemed to flow past too quickly. It had, unfortunately, taken the old Miko with it. 

It wasn’t an excuse. No, Kaede would never say it was. But Kagome wasn’t the only person she had to worry about. And even though she would have to train someone else to forage for herbs, she was happy that the girl was heading to more familiar faces that could possibly drag her from her own sorrow. 

Kagome herself, in these moments of watching the fading village and familiar fields, felt a sweep of anxiety. Things that felt hot under her sternum, causing her heart to flutter.

Would they be angry with her? 

Well, she knew the answer to that. But the anger would come from a place better than what she felt for herself. 

Kagome sighed and turned away from Kaede’s Village before burying her nose into the fur and Kirara’s nape, eyes freshening with tears. 

“I missed you guys. You know that, right?” 

Kirara didn’t stop moving but turned back to look at her companion. Black windswept hair and the sound of soft breath hissed through the air. Fingers tightly gripped into cream-colored fur in sleep. 

Hours moved by in silence. Kagome would twitch here and there, sometimes she would sob or moan, but then she would fall back to sleep. It was stressful, but Kirara was glad that she was getting sleep at least. The worn-out eyes and the frail hands flashed behind her eyes often enough to keep her from just waking the Miko up. 

It wasn’t until the sun was low in the sky, cutting between the mountain in hard ribbons of gold as Kirara seemed to chase it, did Kagome finally fully stir. 

They were close to the canopy of trees, just below the timberline. So close, she could hear the howl of a lone wolf somewhere under them. It sounded mournful and it made Kagome’s heartache anew, for different reasons. 

Or, it did. 

Then, like a cacophony, a wild symphony, other howls rose up from under the trees. Rising and turning, like a siren. 

Kagome shifted in her spot. Uncomfortable. And in response Kirara shifted too, her hair sticking on end as she moved to fly higher, legs working in the air as if she were swimming. 

It was so odd. Why were the wolves…?

Then, up through the canopy, arching through the air with terrifying precision, a single spear. Tipped in bronze. And it happened in such detail to Kagome that she could even see the wrappings of leather bind its way up the midsection. 

It missed her, but only by a hair. 

And the hundred of others that followed it, well, they had their own chances to hit. 

Kagome screamed and tightly pressed herself into Kirara’s back, trying to flatten herself away from those bronze edges as the aforementioned demon twisted herself through the air in an attempt to dodge. 

All those spears had their chances. 

_They all had their chances. And Kagome had wasted hers on a man who didn’t love her._

They all had their chances. 

So Kagome was happy that the chance one to hit, hit her instead of Kirara. 

It didn’t even hurt as it slid up her side and over her shoulder, severing her right trapezius and backpack strap before entering the sky again. Before she, herself, entered the sky in a different direction. Her fingers slipping through cream fur as the sun died on the horizon. 

The sky turned red and the world hissed around Kagome while, somewhere near her feet, Kirara roared and somewhere near her head wolves howled again, still discordant and wild. And Kagome screamed along with them. 

Leaves slapped against her, and through her panic, Kagome slapped back, grabbing and tearing as her body fell. Unable to see or orientate herself, she couldn’t gauge just where to grasp, or even if she could, but as thin whips of branches cut through her skin and air hissed past her ears, her arms finally hooked around a limb. 

Kagome was there for a matter of seconds, moments really, before something else- most assuredly another spear- tore through her thigh and her right arm gave out. 

Kagome didn’t scream until she hit the ground, the sound of her leg snapping like a dried bit of driftwood heralding her more clearly than the weak wail that escaped her clenched teeth. 

Immediately a cold nose pressed to her neck and stinking teeth skimmed her collarbone, a growl shuddering from the throat of the beast through Kagome’s beaten body. There was a short inhale through that cold nose-

A very potent pause flooded the area. No howls, no clangs of metal. Nothing. And for that second, where everything seemed to shut down, Kagome was sure that she had died. That the wolf, or something or someone else, had killed her. 

Then there was a whimper. Then a whine. And the wolf standing above her shuffled low, pressing its chin against her sternum and licking the underside of her jaw as its tail thumped and swayed against the ground. As if both begging and trying to remedy the situation. Like a faithful hound. 

Kagome couldn’t help it, she lifted her uninjured arm and patted at the wolf, missing the first few times until she finally hit the spot between its ears, scratching gently. 

And just like that, the forest was in an uproar. Panic swallowed the place so intensely that Kagome could taste it. As if someone had lit a palace on fire. Or a village was being swept away by a landslide. 

But it didn’t last long. She didn’t feel like she was dying, but there was a hazy feeling creeping around her eyes. Had she hit her head? Or was it the blood loss?

Then someone was touching her, picking her head up off the ground and cradling it. 

She almost laughed when she saw that stupid mohawk. It was the only thing she could see in the dark. 

“Hakkaku, haa ha.” Kagome licked her lips and shifted her head, unable to make out what the wolf demon was trying to tell her. His lips were moving far too fast. “Why’d ya sound so sad?”


	2. The Shamen Was Old and Her Words Were Bitter

_ Tea tainting her tongue and sweat on her brow, Kagome laid on her sleeping palette and tried to force herself to sleep. It was late and she needed to tend to an elderly woman in the morning, but she was worried.  _

_ Inuyasha was gone again.  _

_ He often proclaimed he was doing patrols out in the nighttime, going up the edge of the village and skirting the border of the rice fields. However, when sought out, he was always shifting around the goshinboku.  _

_ Laying between curled roots, arms folded over his chest. Hair uncombed and wild, like she liked it. His face stony, passive.  _

_ Ears pressed against his head.  _

_ Kagome only saw him twice, but after she found out he’d been doing it since the defeat of Naraku, she ignored it. Tried to ignore it.  _

_ If she didn’t see it, it wasn’t happening, right?  _

_ This is what they wanted, right?  _

_ They held hands, they kissed, they made love together. They were expecting!  _

_ But Inuyasha’s eyes seemed faded. His behavior was odd and he no longer sought out fights. No longer sought her out at night. _

_ Like a sick dog.  _

_ She had tried- she really had. Tried to ask him what was wrong, what she could do. What they could do.  _

_ When she held his hand, his callouses had grown softer.  _

_ But she missed him. Or, she tried to.  _

_ Kagome wanted to miss him. To feel as she did when she was fifteen and practically a fetus in a world she was new to. Inuyasha had been her hero, of course, she wanted to love him. Had loved him _

_ Had loved the idea of him.  _

_ But now, she was sitting up- awake. Maybe it was him, maybe it was how cold things had gotten between them.  _

_ When she realized she was fine with him sleeping a meter away, she had cried. But now she was more freaked out when he got close.  _

_ Kagome sighed and pulled her hand through her hair and put her hand on her stomach. She was five months in, a few weeks ago she’d begun to start feeling movement.  _

_ A mosquito flew past her ear and Kagome swatted half-heartedly at the insect.  _

_ Her pregnancy and the birth wouldn’t fix it between her and Inuyasha. Kagome had a feeling that nothing ever would. But god she wanted to. She wanted to feel something again.  _

_ Kiss him and feel his lips move. His arms around her and the sweet feeling of being wanted.  _

_ Kagome shifted, pulling her blanket up to her neck as a strange sense of deja vu swept over her. A touch of dread biting her spine.  _

_ No no, she just needed to sleep. She was overly tired. - _

_ It was like the moment she slipped her eyes shut the pain started. Deep in her uterus, stringing up against her womb and curing around her insides.  _

_ And when her eyes snapped open, Inuyasha was at his place against the wall. Asleep, shifting only when something rushed against her leg.  _

_ Iron and copper.  _

_ Kagome toes curled and her back arched, a scream caught in her throat as her body contracted.  _

_ No. No! No! No, no no, no! Please god no! _

_ Her hands gripped her stomach and her abdominal muscles pushed without command. Another rush of blood and the smell of amniotic fluid.  _

_ Finally, she screamed and Inuyasha was up, rolling on the balls of his feet as his hand fell over his sword. His eyes needle marks in the dim light.  _

_ But then he saw her, and the eyes dulled and his hand fell away. Hopeless, swinging as it came to his side. It was like something wasn’t clicking in his head. Like he was watching a movie instead of real-life.  _

_ Do something.  _

_ ‘Please help me!’ Kagome couldn’t form words. It was the worst pain she’d ever felt. Blood-curdling. So deep she could feel it in her bones.  _

_ Kagome weakly reached out to Inuyasha. She needed help. She needed him.  _

_ But he looked at her hand like he had never seen it before. A strange and cursed artifact.  _

_ ‘Please help me.’ _

_ Then, and she was sure that if he was a dog his hair would be on end, he froze up. Muscle tense under his skin, almost as if he was having a full-body cramp. _

_ A mosquito buzzed past her ear again, wings brushing her lobe.  _

The image of Inuyasha fleeing out the door faded before it could happen, the climax of her dreams every night, as her hand came to slap at the side of her face. 

Blood and bug guts came away on her hand, smeared with twitching legs. 

“Yeauuuhh…” Kagome rubbed away the remains of the bug, her eyes adjusting enough as she did so. She was not on her back, the way she had slept for her whole life. Instead, she was pressed to a litany of pelts which smelt of old herb, tonics, and, beneath it all, blood. 

Kagome lurched in place, a thin slice of panic coiling her insides like burning timber: the memory of spears and sober wolf song careening through her mind. The wolves. The spears. Kirara. Hakkaku. 

Lurching again, Kagome tried to get up- only for a hand to firmly press her down. Unkindly, right over the bloody break in the skin where the initial spear had hit. Sucking in a breath, she shied away from the hand holding her. 

“Don’t move.” The voice was hard but female. Smokey and accented like someone who had been through it all. It was demanding. “I’m not stitching you back together again, human.”

Ah. 

Great. 

She had sincerely missed being dwindled down to her species, she  _ really _ had. It was refreshing, like stepping into a pile of wet cat vomit while wearing socks. 

“Where’s Kirara?” Her voice was scratchy, and she could feel flem in her lungs that made a rattling sound as she breathed. 

The woman took a vocal puff of something before grunting again, her hand firm on Kagome’s back. “Pfft. The cat? The boys let it go.” There was a pause, a snort. “Waste of a good pelt if ya askin me.”

Kagome just didn’t have the energy right now to snap at the unknown woman and favored leaning her cheek against the fur under her. She felt sick and hurt. 

The way she was facing, she was looking into the den. It had been dug out, deep claw marks cutting rivets into the packed earth. Pots, made of roped clay, sat in dusty corners as curls of bark and sprigs of leaves peaked from under their lids. Rags, bloody and wet with poultices and water hung from bamboo sticks. 

It reminded Kagome of her thirst, unnoticed before, as she watched the rags drip moisture to the ground. But the sharp feeling of a migraine kept her from voicing her discomfort, not desiring to agitate the woman watching her. 

So she watched the drips. 

And watched.

And watched. 

Kagome was fading when she heard the sound of creaking knees and a grunt, followed by the sound of shuffling, pulling her attention away from that favorite past-time of zoning out. Turning her head slowly, she watched a hunched back and a crop of dark grey hair, tied in a bunch at the nape, as the woman ducked under the lip of earth and disappeared out of sight. 

Wolves. So many wolves. 

Back and forth in front of the opening: walking and running. Even wolf demons in their true forms, hulking and powerful as they towered tall over the others. Plain as day. 

Kagome had never seen a wolf in their true form and her hand itched to reach out and feel the black sable capes that marked their backs. What Ginta and Hakkaku look like? The old woman? 

Kouga? 

There was a sharp feeling deep behind her sternum, like being punched, that was followed by swelling and pulsating thrum. He’d cut contact when she announced her marriage to Inuyasha. 

Maybe leaving without saying anything was part of being a demon? 

Whatever. She would pretend  _ that _ didn’t hurt. 

Kagome turned away from the den opening after that. She didn’t want to see him, see how far she’d fallen. Didn’t want the questions. 

Maybe she wanted to demonize him, no pun intended, into someone smug and mocking. Make the fact they hadn’t spoken in years less her fault. 

But deep down, what was she expecting? 

Perhaps it was the checking in that she had really missed. Someone other than the villagers who looked at her like a ‘ _ well-respected miko, defeater of Naraku” _ and more like a person. Capable of disagreement and friendship. 

She missed him. She missed Shippo. She missed Miroku and Sango. 

Kagome was too dehydrated to cry, so instead let out a short and weak moan: like an animal in pain as she turned and pressed her face straight into the pelts. Couldn’t life just fucking stop? Stop and let her rest for a fucking second? 

She missed her  _ baby.  _

Kagome was ready to wail, to scream, to pull her hair out, to do something,  _ anything, _ to stop this crushing pain in her heart. She wanted it to  _ end.  _

A cold nose pressed to the back of her neck, startling the woman out of her reverie and sorrow as a wolf nuzzled into the back of her neck. Kagome turned her head to get a look only to have her face slathered in long, drooling kisses. 

“Hey-” Mistake. The wolf’s tongue got between her lips. “Uh- Pfbfbbbbft!” 

Kagome took one hand to push the muzzle of the mountain wolf away, trying to readjust so she could get a look at the seemingly happy wolf: dopey dog smile and a wagging tail. Instead of staying still, the wolf fell to its side and rolled gently into her.

“Pfft. Ok, ok.” Kagome whispered as she scratched at the wolf’s neck and chest, earning herself happy ‘dog’ kicks from one of their legs. It was weird, of course, Kagome had never been approached by a wolf in that fashion before. Hell, she hadn’t interacted with dogs, sans dog demons, often. 

Hilariously enough, she was still a cat person. 

But the wolf was friendly, and when her arm tired they were satisfied enough to just sit there with her hand in their fur. The slow thump of its tail lulling her. 

It lasted until that frizzy haired wolf-woman came storming back, pitching growls that made Kagome’s wolf friend tuck tail and run out of the den, leaving her behind with the sour shaman. 

Kagome stared longingly, wishing to follow the wolf as the woman stumbled back in, grunting and hissing as she maneuvered a pail of water in her withered hands. Her lemon-sour face pinched just like a snarling wolf. 

Just as Kagome was about to as a bitter ‘ _ Why’d ya do that?’ _ , the woman shuffled over and stuck the business end of a ladle to her lips. And with that, all of Kagome’s complaints disappeared as she greedily slurped down streams of water. Scoop after scoop until the woman cut her off, to Kagome’s displeasure, as she turned and drank the rest of the water right out of the wooden pail. 

Ok, fine, she wouldn’t snap at the woman for scaring away her wolf friend. 

“How long was I out?” It was tentative, as Kagome didn’t want to irritate the old demon more than she apparently already was. 

There was a pause, then the cracking sounds of something being lit before a waft of pipe-smoke thickened the air. “Too damn long!”

There was an audible inhale followed by a loud cough. 

“Mmm! Eugh! Those damn boys brought you, the wolves were all uppity and whinin’ like no one business. Made me think something was actually wrong!” Another gravelly inhale. “Catch me off what I found out it was gaddamn  _ Kagome _ bein’ the one I needed to fix up. Puh, and I told them I didn’t want cha-”

Kagome started. Sure, she expected Hakkaku and Ginta to tell the woman who she was, they  _ were friends. _ But this woman was reacting as if she had known who Kagome was from the get-go. And it wasn’t good. 

“But they wouldn’t listen to me! I told em Kouga would be  _ pissed _ . That he didn’t want to hide nor hair of ya ‘round here-”

“Wait, what?” Kagome interrupted the woman’s tirade. That couldn’t be right, Kouga had  _ spoken _ to her in a year but he didn’t  _ hate  _ her. He had spoken to her last when Naraku fell. 

Sure, he didn’t come to her wedding, but looking back she had wished she hadn’t attended it herself. 

“Well, you humans hunted this last year- took down friends and family. None of ya are allowed on this mountain! None! Of! Ya! You were the ‘spared’ one, but one of the young pups came parading out and started the onslaught. Now I gotta worry ‘bout Jun getting his ass beat by Kouga when he gets back-”

“Woah, wait-” Kagome tried to lift herself to better look at the demon, but when she moved one of her arms it was lanced with a horrible pain that trickled down her back. Kagome sucked in a sharp gasp, bucking down and laying face first once again. 

“What did I just tell you? Are you goddamn daft girl?” The woman lurched over and swatted her good arm before pulling apart the blankets that covered her from the foot to the shoulder. Buck-ass naked. That's what Kagome was under those strips of cloth and hide and her body flooded red with blush. 

“Stop that shit, you’re  _ gonna _ make your wound bleed!” The shaman hissed as she pressed her palms against the tender skin.

“I’m naked!” Kagome’s voice was quiet, squeaky as she pressed her face into the pelts in embarrassment. Modesty, both influenced by her world and this one, had changed her as she got older, and she could hear the footsteps of the pack outside. People had turned to look at her even when she  _ was _ covered by the hide  _ before _ the shaman had decided to have a shouting match with her. 

“What? Who gives a shit! We’ve all seen each other naked and you ain’t nothing special!” 

It didn’t  _ matter _ if she was ‘nothing special’, she didn’t want  _ anyone _ to see this body. Like people could read the misery on her skin, her failures. Like they knew what had happened and they would judge her for it. 

Just end her now. 

Instead of begging for the end, Kagome ground her teeth and tried to settle herself down, trying to forget the cool air that drifted over her back and legs. They weren’t staring. They didn’t know. No one knew. No one  _ would _ know. 

As she repeated it to herself, the shaman layered on a new poultice that stung briefly before deadening her skin to a numb cold, mumbling as she worked it into Kagome’s skin. Her irritation came through in the firmness of the hands, unkind, as she packed new dressings into the wound. 

“There! Now stop moving!”

The moment the pelts found their place over Kagome again, she relaxed and let out a shuddering breath. It was secure- heavy over her flesh. She focused on her breath as the arthritis inflicted shaman stumbled back into her spot, picking up her discard pipe. 

Breath in. Breath out. 

Breath in. 

“What do you mean Kouga didn’t want me here?” It was small, but Kagome knew that the demon heard her. 

There was a long exhale and the smell of the pipe filled the room more heavily. 

“Kouga didn’t want humans on the land. You’re a human if ya didn’t catch that.”

Kagome, if she wasn’t so emotionally frayed, would have rolled her eyes. Instead, she asked another question. “What have the humans been doing?”

“....hmmm.” The shamen crowed as she let out another audible puff of smoke. “What? Haven’t come through here in a bit? Last winter the humans began crawling up the mountain face like damn  _ insects _ . First, they messed around with our huntin’, being unable to do anything but  _ stab _ and since  _ you were a thing-” _

Kagome couldn’t help but feel like the woman had implied she was a passing fad. A fancy turned sour. 

“-we weren’t allowed to just, ya know, kill ‘em for trespassing. Then a few companion wolves went missing. We knew where they went, it wasn’t a damn mystery. You humans don’t know what’s off limits-”

Kagome was about to interrupt, to proclaim her own innocence to the shaman-

“Then Haku went missing.” there was a misty sound to her voice, rougher than before as if she was choking back something. “Then Nagi and his son Hajime. You humans killed our babies.”

Kagome had felt her heart quiver at the death list, cramping and turning in her gutted chest. Then the words ‘you’, ‘killed’, and ‘children’ appeared in the same sentence, rife with an accusatory tone. 

And Kagome felt herself flush cold. Guilt turning her gut, her blood turning to slush. 

Her baby. Had she killed her baby. 

The woman saw through her- she had to have. That was the only way- the only reason for her to say something so terrible.  _ The shamen was convicting her of her crimes.  _

That had to be it. Kagome’s brain couldn’t conceptualize that the woman was just biased, racially charged and ready to blame anyone who shared a species. 

No. Not in Kagome’s head. 

To her, she had just become a convicted killer. A killer of her own baby. 

Kagome suffered a breakdown. Grabbing her hair and wailing so  _ long and hard _ that wolves began to howl and wail with her. 

She was so far into her mental breakdown that she didn’t notice the shamen spring up, shaking in surprise as the air blistered and churned with the fragrant stench of sorrow-fueled power. Electric in the air. 

“Stop! Stop it now!” The woman howled at Kagome, who had only taken a break in her tragic wailing to suck in a shuddering breath as tears pooled into her mouth. 

Wolves and wolf demons alike ran to the area, panicked as they swelled at the doorway. The wolf from before had broken in first, only to whine and pant when they caught the absolute  _ pain _ their human had somehow been put into. 

“What happened?!” Ginta, tailed by Hakkaku, panted as he shouldered himself into the small space. The two second-in-commands were met with a wailing woman, their Kagome, seemingly  _ suffering _ in her pelt sickbed. It was tangible. They could taste it, feel it.

Their shamen, known as Fumino to them, was standing to the side where she had previously just been seated, hands fiddling with an herbal sedative as she tried to spread it on a soaked piece of cloth. 

Hakkaku moved to Kagome as Ginta tried to get an answer out of Fumino, immediately trying to get her hands to unravel from her hair. 

“Come on sis, it’s ok, come on!” Hakkaku whispered as he got one hand unfurled, putting his own hand in its place. If he wasn’t a demon, he was sure that the pressure of her grip would have been uncomfortable- perhaps painful. He didn’t know what happened, didn’t really care either, just wanted Kagome to calm down. Maybe then they could help, yeah?

He hoped so. 

Hakkaku kept trying to talk to Kagome, while Ginta got something out of Fumino. 

“I was talkin’ about the damn humans! She wanted to know, so I told her!” The shamen hissed as she fumbled and wrapped the rag around her hand. “She just started wailing like a dying animal!”

“Are you sure?” Ginta was uncomfortable, highly so. Wolves were empathetic toward pack members, and despite Kagome being gone for so long, she still counted. She was still their sister. And while he knew that Kagome would be  _ outraged _ and equally  _ sympathetic _ , these were the sounds that Hana had made when word got back that Nagi and Hajime were murdered. 

“I don’t know!” Fumino snapped her still-sharp teeth at the younger wolf before approaching the now whining Kagome, her voice stripped and her diaphragm quaking. She sounded like she was trying to say something, but she wasn’t able to get anything out. 

Fumino didn’t wait for the wolf-men to respond and, with creaking knees, slapped the cloth over Kagome’s nose and mouth. It wasn’t instantaneous, and Hakkaku and Ginta couldn’t even be sure if Kagome even  _ noticed _ it. 

Finally, the only whining in the den was the wolf who settled itself against Kagome’s side, tail still tucked. Outside the group of wolf demons and wolves, stayed behind for only a bit. There were mostly sounds of concern, some of sympathy, as they walked back to their jobs. 

If Ginta and Hakkaku could sense the pain, so could they. And it throbbed through the air. Pulsed. 

Hakkaku let go of Kagome’s limp hand and shifted her head gently when she went boneless. It was then that he caught sight of Kagome’s neck, a blurred, healing scar where he knew Inuyasha had marked her, causing him to flinch back. 

Ginta saw it and his scent soured. Everything soured. 

They didn’t know what was behind…  _ everything _ , but it caused them to feel an ache deep behind their sternums. It called to them. 

“We gotta tell Kouga.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a snappy ending. I just didn't want to overthink anything. 
> 
> I don't like creating OCs. I don't. It can be very Mary Sue sometimes, with unrealistic behaviors that simply put the protagonist on a pedestal. However, I tried. 
> 
> I really, really tried. 
> 
> With Fumino, the wolf Shamen, I tried to make her very blatantly "Old". Like, my own grandmother was a nurse and she talked super blatantly about a thing today that would have been considered *holy shit*. Child death and miscarriages among them. 
> 
> The wolf is just because I need something good to be in here. 
> 
> Don't be afraid to tell me what you think about the characters. I'll try to keep it on the down down, but this was mainly a world-building chapter.


	3. A Wild Breed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Ginta seeks out Kouga.

Ginta scaled another mountain steppe, his legs burning and his finger’s white-knuckled as he skirted another human hunting patrol. Their dogs had barked and howled at his back when he had passed, sharp arrows had pierced the wind beside him. 

It was a rough time. It  _ had _ been a rough time for the past year. 

Now that demon populations had been whittled down and Naraku no longer held his tyranny, humans had taken the spider place. Eating up the land, killing for sport. 

And the wolves, once dense and terrible, had been  _ forced back _ . 

Naraku had taken a good chunk of them out during the massacre, and when he had died everyone had high hopes that with  _ the _ Prince Kouga could rebuild then faster. His leadership and strength had been tantamount to keeping everyone together as displaced wolves sought his presence for a place amongst the pack. 

Things had been looking up for maybe a  _ month _ at most. 

Then the humans set in. Like a plague. 

Kouga had allowed them, graciously, to set up at the bottom of the mountain. There was a small bunch at first, a few skinny men and women who hunted and gathered in the woods. An excusable amount, an ignorable amount. 

Then more came. 

And more. 

Now it was a village- and a large one at that. And they brought dogs, horses, and weapons. Hearts hardened by the reign of war that had destroyed Japan and clear hatred of demons. 

And with all those things, they had caused hurt. Many of the feral wolves that the humans had come in contact with had not come back unscathed, if not at all. Then hunting parties got hit by the humans. Then Haku chased his last deer when the old wolf got hit in the neck with an arrow. 

Then Nagi had taken Hajime on his _first hunt_ … And, well. 

That’s when Kouga, who had already begun to take heavy precautions when some of the wolves had been killed, had closed it all off to humans. It wasn’t the savage killing that Kouga had commanded before the uprising of Naraku… before Kagome… but it was precise and deadly. 

Anyone who entered the mountain woods of human origin was killed. 

That’s how it was now. 

Of course, it spawned an all-out war between the humans and the wolf tribe. Which wouldn’t have been such a  _ big deal _ if the wolf tribe still wasn’t recovering their lost numbers and the humans weren’t fucking  _ like rabbits. _

It was difficult. It was debilitating. 

It was humiliating. 

Wolves, albeit not as proud as the dog demons of the new age, were being dethroned and killed in their own kingdom. Recklessly and without purpose. 

And that’s why Kouga was absent when Kagome had appeared, having left the tribe to seek the aid of other struggling demon clans. Taking up his Prince-hood and laying it at the feet of other leaders, pleading to save his own race. 

Dark days were ahead. 

And that circled Ginta’s thought right back around to sister Kagome. He...honestly didn’t know what to think. Or feel. 

After the death of Naraku and the subsequent mating of Inuyasha to Kagome, Kouga had all but banned her name from the tribe. Not that anyone blamed him, per se, but it was like he tried to wipe her from his memory. Didn’t bring her up, didn’t even talk about Naraku or the Jewel. 

Ginta couldn’t tell if he was sad that she had chosen the dog, or if he was just so enveloped in the crisis he had put thought of her away. 

At some point, Hakakku brought up the idea that Kouga had never really been interested  _ to begin with. _

It was a shocking proclamation. Something that would have tainted Kouga’s reputation. You didn’t just... _ claim a mate _ as a joke. They weren’t trophies. They weren’t a game to be won. 

It was a niggle of doubt, sure, but it had affected both wolves in Kouga’s absence. 

And when Kagome came crashing through the sky…

Well. They were sure the sky was going to fall with her. 

Gods what  _ a fucking mistake.  _

Ginta felt bad for Kagome, a flush of guilt when he and Hakkaku couldn’t get the other wolves to stand down when they smelt human. Not only a human but one coming from overhead. 

It had been pure pandemonium. 

And when she was struck, and  _ damn it all,  _ Ginta had seen it the moment that spear struck her; he thought the worst. A spear through the ribs, a puncture to the lungs. 

What would they have done if they had killed her? 

What the fuck would they have done? 

But she didn’t die. Her body was broken and bleeding, but not defeated. Something that had kept  _ them,  _ even without Kouga around, entranced throughout the years they had known her. So much spirit in a flimsy human skin. 

Interrupting his internal monologue, Ginta frowned as he rounded a rocky outcrop, his feet hitting softly as he strained to hear around him. He was traveling alone, for speed’s sake, and the pervasive threat of an ambush had his nerves wired. 

But the sounds of dogs and the snap of bowstrings had faded in the distance. Ginta hoped, desperately, that it stayed that way. 

He hoped it was that way for Hakkaku as well, seeing as he had received the short end of the stick and had to approach the  _ demon-slayer village _ . Being the larger, more physically fit wolf AND the one with better socialization- well, Ginta didn’t event those traits anymore. 

They hadn’t had any trouble from the Demon-slayers or the Monks, but everything and everyone was dancing on thin ice. There was no mistake that the wolves were still demons and the slayers and monks were still human, even though past relationships indicated friendship. 

Also, they had shot Kagome out of the sky. 

Ginta rubbed at his face, heels of his hands digging softly into his eyes until spots of color floated in them. What a fucking  _ mess.  _

Hakkaku would have to tell the slayer and the monk that they had shot a mutual friend and, in the same breadth of time, Ginta would have to tell Kouga the  _ same thing.  _

Nevermind-he wasn’t sure who had drawn the short end of the stick. Both parties seemed to be in the worst of it. 

As Ginta approached the border, the scent of humans and wolves viciously meshing, his tension shifted from the future to the present. 

Birds cawed in the background and somewhere a squirrel chattered. It sounded like he was alone, but he knew better about the ways of humans. They laid in wait often. Buried under leaves or hiding in the tops of trees.

Just as bad as Naraku. 

Ginta crept from behind a tree, leaving his armored chest against the rough bark of the walnut as he gazed into the glowing sunset. The treeline was battered and it was easy to see the horizon. 

A whine of pain crept up the back of Ginta’s throat. 

No longer were young saplings building their roots and the grasses and shrubbery had been carved away. There was an ever-present smell of dog urine and horse crap, hard paths and buildings settled ominously in the distance. 

A lord’s house squatted in the middle of the housing groups. Over-bred horses stood in strict lines over rich sweat-grass.

It broke up the area. Fragmented it. 

Migrating animals, such as the wolves, birds, and deer, would be unable to take the worn ancestral paths to their new areas. 

It wasn’t natural, Ginta mused morbidly, to sit in one place. To suck up the nature around you and leave nothing but a husk. A point of sickness in the already very sick Japan. 

There would be more. 

Ginta was quite young in terms of demon hood. A drop in an endless pond his bloodline provided. He was alive before the birth of Kaede’s village. Before the barrier of Mount Hakurei was erected. His mother had been alive when Japan had still been connected to the mainland. But that had given him a front-row seat on how quickly things could change. How the world would morph and things would never revert back. 

Hell… he’d heard stories of the dogs coming over. Foreigners that bore resemblance to those of wolf-kind. Strong, but strangely domesticated, something that Fumino would never shut up about. 

But it was true, Ginta relented. 

If one were to compare Sesshoumaru to Kouga, the only similarities would be in the ways their teeth aligned in their jaws. 

It wasn’t something Ginta felt comfortable with. Something that became even  _ more _ unrelentingly uncomfortable when the tribe had associated itself with Inuyasha through Kagome. 

Like seeing something uncanny up close, and realizing just how right you were to be unnerved. 

Ginta chewed on his tongue, his eyes glimpsing the trailing edge of soldiers as they walked the border adjacent to his hiding place as then spilled from a low-field. They were dressed in dark reds and muddy browns and many carried exquisitely maintained bows. Some of them were mounted on horseback, the animals shifting and black beneath their human riders. 

In the dying light, their torches shimmered along the tree line. One of their dogs brayed loudly and the squirrel stopped chattering. One of the humans on horseback held the talons of a hawk and wore the cape of a  _ wolf. _

He needed to move  _ now _ . 

Springing from his spot, Ginta broke out into a run in the opposite direction with his tail tucked as he bent forward into a four-legged gait. A split between animal and man, quickly shifting and changing into something that only portrayed wolf as he slipped into his birth form. 

Somewhere above him, the bird cawed again before a sharp whistle ended it mid-song. They knew he was here. And no longer was Ginta a proud wolven hunter, but that of prey. 

Wind careened through Ginta’s fur, hissing past his ears as he bound between trees. He was larger in his true form, but his skin was thick and his gait was strong. His teeth could clip the heads from their shoulders and he could swallow their dogs whole. He stood larger than their horses.

But who would watch his back when they turned their knives on him? 

There were so many and they came from all angles. He would not win- as others before him hadn’t won.

An arrow hissed by him, its head burying itself into the flesh of a tree and the air around him was filled with the harping yaps of dogs. Bred for their mountain hunting, they looked like juvenile wolves. Disturbing and grating, it made Ginta bite-shy when they too, came careening up next to him. 

It made his bones ache and his skin itch. 

Another arrow whistled through the air, and something within Ginta’s gut dropped. This one would hit him, unable to dodge as he was boxed in by their dogs. 

_ Thock.  _

An arrow clipped its way through his fur and into the hard scrape of skin and muscle, grinding to a stop against the place his ribs met with his spine. He couldn’t even make a noise as adrenaline thickened his instincts and numbed the scalding point of pain. 

It wasn’t the first time he would be shot and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. 

Ginta ran to the trails upward, his claws digging into the loose soil as he grappled with the lip of an overhang as he tried to reenter the harder to navigate the territory of the mountains: the shouts of men and the barks of dogs heralding him. 

Then, like a flash of black on an already dying horizon, a wolf arced against the sky in a hard, dominant shadow. Blue eyes reflecting nearly white in the scope of endless black fur as it stood perched on the edge of the mountain. Three times the size of Ginta and his mouth in an open snarl. 

_ Kouga.  _

It had been a rare occurrence in the past decades for Kouga to take a form such as this, but no longer did he look like Ginta: legs too long, fur lacking adult sleekness, and a face lacking the hardness of an adult demon. 

But here,  _ now, _ Kouga was proud. Coming into his age, his true form glistening with the dying sun. 

Ginta, upon seeing the Wolf Prince, gave a deep chuff as he gained confidence from the appearance of his Lord and Prince. One of his best friends. 

It resonated within him, and his tail untucked itself and his panting jaws became an aggressive cave of teeth and tongue: now fully inclined to fight back the human infection. 

A dog, its black coat a shadow beside Ginta, was the first to go. It was nothing against Ginta’s teeth, just a sack of meat and bones. 

The humans, ever-present, did not seem to notice the change as their panting horses crowned the edge of the ridge, their hooves clicking horribly against the stones. No, no, they pulled their bows, and Ginta was hit once again, his balance throttled as an arrow snapped itself in the edge of his shoulder blade. 

Kouga, who had been momentarily stunned by the appearance of Ginta, who was most certainly  _ not supposed to be out this far _ , finally slipped from the disconnect to see the twelve-man cavalry on the hunt. 

A snarl so deep it rattled the rock-bound trees around him echoed down the mountain and the horses, no matter how well trained they were, bucked and screamed. The dogs scattered like cockroaches. 

But that did not save them, the fear that permeated the air simply fueled the Wolf Prince as he thundered down the mountains, his claws leaving marks as he propelled himself to where Ginta and the humans stood. 

An arrow found its way into his bicep and another clipped its way through the flesh of his cheek, but all was for naught as Kouga fell first upon a spooked horse and its rider, using his massive paw to crush both into the ground itself. 

Ginta, on the other hand, was not as large as his leader. His time was filled with grappling the men off their horses or snipping the legs and throats of those over-bred horses. The dogs, in a funny turnabout, had left their masters to trip and stumble their way down the mountain paths. 

With the demons close by, the humans had abandoned their bows for use of their swords, the blade itself marked with the speech of holy men. Both Ginta and Kouga could feel their electricity arc the air, tingling along their skin and tunneling to their bones. 

Ginta had to hold back a yelp as one of those swords slit the air so close that it cut the fur next to his ear. 

_ Shit.  _

Putting distance away from the humans, some still perched tediously on the backs of their horses while others had begun to fight on foot. They were nothing if not resolute. 

But Kouga wasn’t having it. There was a sound, akin to a bone-breaking or many trees snapping, as the Wolf Prince warned his comrade who promptly dug back and fled the span of humans  _ just _ as Kouga slammed his strong leg into the curve of an overhang. 

There was a moment of silence as Kouga, himself, leaped from the path and time stood still- 

-until the crashing of rocks and boulders loudly echoed off of the mountain. Grinding against themselves as the earth split and tumbled down upon the fleeing troop of humans. Eating and chewing armor, flesh, and bone between stone teeth.

Ginta skidded next to Kouge, panting as the Wolf Prince turned and pressed on through the woods, a determined stride back toward the encampment. And, of course, the second in command fell in stride naturally. 

Until panic slammed into him.

With speed he wasn’t sure he contained, Ginta thrust himself forward, his steps more panicked than determined as he tried to catch the attention of Kouga.

_ Come on, come on! _

With frantic barking and the tenacity of someone who had survived the reign of Naraku, Ginta finally stepped in front of Kouga and caught his attention- albeit not the kind of attention Ginta would have preferred. 

Ginta went flying as Kouga tossed him by the nape of his neck, a growl on his tongue that made the subordinates fur stand on end. 

Unable to speak past body language and basic mouth noises, Ginta struggled into his human form- shivering and mussed as he cowered in front of Kouga. 

“ _ What do _ you  _ think  _ you are  _ doing!?” _ Ginta had kept his eyes low and his head forward, his body in a non-aggressive stance, so he had not caught the shift that Kouga had made until he was on him. 

He knew what Kouga was thinking: there would only be one reason that Ginta would be  _ this far _ to find him: pure tragedy. Massive destruction. Death. 

And all of a sudden, Ginta felt very, very stupid for trying to find Kouga because of Kagome. Sure, Kagome was their sister- a princess in her own right- but she was in  _ good hands.  _ And, again, he wasn’t even sure  _ Kouga cared about her.  _

“I-it’s Kagome. We- we shot her off the demon ca-”

Ginta let out a short yell as he was  _ struck _ so harshly in the jaw he saw stars, his body following through as he collapsed on his back- Kouga above him, gripping his bare shoulders. 

They were a wild breed, the wolves. Full of instinct and rash reactions. But Ginta had never seen that  _ kind of wild _ in Kouga before. Had never smelt  _ that _ kind of fear on him. 

But there, as Ginta sat dazed, on his back under the throttle of his screaming leader- no words to be heard, just pure emotion- his heart ached so intensely his ribcage hurt. 

“Sis is fine! She’s ok!” It was behind the garble of blood that Ginta spoke, his jaw aching. “Fumino’s got her! She  _ there.”  _

Ginta was drug upward by the shoulders, Kouga forcing him to his feet as his own black hair stuck to his wild, bloody face. 

And then, Ginta was left behind: staring dazed at the naked back of Kouga, tail straight behind him, as he raced back to the camp. 

  
_ Ah shit.  _ Ginta thought as he spat out a stream of blood and began to follow behind on two feet, his own tail tucked between his legs. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a painful chapter to write. Not form anything internally, but just for the connecting values. I haven't watched Inuyasha in some time, so I did a crash course in Ginta and Hakkaku....and realized they were underdeveloped. Well, the background characters of a secondary character I suppose. 
> 
> This was also more WORLD BUILDING. Because this post-canon, it's not like I can use Nar Nar for content.   
> The dogs referenced were Kia Ken. 
> 
> The Honshu Wolf went extinct, by the way. So I am very...hesitant to imply that these *are* Japanese wolves. I kinda..never understood why that wasn't brought up in the Anime/Manga. like "Hey Kouga, you go extinct". 
> 
> Its late, I'm tired. Please review. That you for all the awesome ones for the last chapter.


	4. Froth and Blood Betwixt the Teeth

He really hadn’t been sad when Kagome mated Inuyasha. No- he knew that it was dog-breath she had eyes for. 

The low glow blue, the soft pink lips-

Yes, she was gorgeous. She was smart. She was caring-

She mated Inuyasha. 

There were times where he had looked back, thought about what he could have done differently. Maybe joined up with the group, maybe showered her with more attention, maybe…

Maybe.   
  


Maybe. 

No. Kouga had let Inuyasha have her… ‘fed her to the dogs’ as some joked. He’d fed her to the dogs. 

And he had been fed to the humans. 

It was so strange- he remembered when he was the ruler of these mountains. Years- hundreds of them- where he stalked the rolling hills at the base in his pup hood and climbed the steppes and summit in his early adulthood. Asserted himself and dominating. 

He was the wolf. He represented them, his heart beats for them. He was wild and young- he should have killed them, eaten their carcasses, burned their homes, and mauled their children. He should have-

But then he would see blue eyes and remember soft pink lips. Somewhere, on some faraway breeze, he would smell the warmth of late spring and the richness of new growth. He would remember Kagome. 

He hadn’t been fed to the humans, but just a single one- 

Her dull teeth biting into his heart, hallowing him from the inside out. 

Now as he ran, his birth form tearing into existence from his false human skin, tossing black fur into the canopy and let him _run true._

Kouga didn’t care if he caught the sight of the evil humans settled into his forest. He _needed_ to see her. Needed to know she was still real in the awful reality. 

_He needed to hold her._ Feel her skin, touch the callouses and scars. He wanted to waste himself on her smell. He would cut himself open and let her live inside him, it would protect them both. 

But Kouga knew better. 

Kagome had only had eyes for Inuyasha. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t _care._ He couldn’t _not care._

He’d tried to not. 

The deer scattered before him, birds rang from the trees with shouting calls, and the long, moorish moans of boars echoed in the distance. He unsettled the place, the harmony snapping in two as he raced to the camp, his paws tossing tornadoes down the mountains. 

But surely that was not enough- his need to _get there_ was not enough. 

There was a twang from a bowstring and he felt the edge of an arrowhead pierce the thick skin stretched over his ribcage, bouncing against bone and holding firm in his meat. 

He didn’t have _time_ for this. But they were here- foolishly. Adrenaline- and the feeling of anxiety flared his fighting spirit and he turned upon them, teeth flashing. 

These were on foot. They reminded him slimly of the demon-slayer that trekked around with Kagome, their black clothing would have let them slick into the shadows. 

But they breathed too loud and their heartbeats, enragingly calm, still twitched in their chest. 

He did not see the pretty face of Kagome when he crushed the first one, the pad of his foot smearing the human into the dirt and stone like a warrior mark on the skin of daiyoukai. 

The next ones bore swords, the trailing carving on them glowing in his demonic presence. Sparking as they moved, making his own skin itch as the strange energy brushed against him. 

He was going to _exterminate_ them. His muscles ached for it-

He-

Kouga did not pause in his attack, but it’s because a lot less for the hunger of pain and more righteous in the fact he was protecting his pack- his family. Images of pups running in their birth form, fur, and paws tangled in rich undergrowth. His brothers hunting deer and boar. 

Kill all humans that enter the mountain pass. 

As he struck out at the humans again; tossing up dirt as he used his youkai to twist streams of air around their bodies, an image curdled his mind. 

Kagome. 

Kagome. 

_Kagome._ Except her skin wasn’t that sweet, peachy tan and her eyes didn’t glitter like water on a summer day. No- she was pale, her body twisted and crushed by the velocity of falling. A spear he helped sharpen pierced her ribcage. 

It was in his follow-through of killing the last of the human invaders that he slipped- a human, who was dead in a second, had thrown his burning blade at him like a throwing knife.

It singed Kouga’s fur, casting a dense smell of burnt hair before it struck the skin of his chest. It wasn’t a strong enough throw to puncture him, but the handle of the blade had pressed against his skin _for a second_ and he fell a bubbling pain crawl over his chest. 

Like a rabbit, Kouga jumped from the blade and rolled- his jaws thrashing and his eyes rolling deep within his skull. Froth coiled between his teeth and his nose burned with tears. Caustic, as pulled and destroyed his nerves. And he sat there, panting hard-

He needed to get up. He needed to get out of there. This place- with human remains cast about- with their _evil_ weapons cursing this place.

More could come at any time. 

Kouga stood, shakily, his chest burning and his flesh melting off the bone as if splashed with acid, smearing matted trails of blood in his black coat. His tongue roved over the area, trying to clean away energy as it pittered out. 

Ginta, who’d been trailing behind him at a distance, had caught up at this point. His low whine receiving a half snarl from Kouga. It was nonaggressive, just a non-verbal sentiment to back off- to not get _so fucking uptight_ that he would accidentally step on one of these cursed swords. 

Kouga wouldn’t be able to help him- just watch as whatever properties the blade had ate away at his packmate. 

His brother in arms respected it, backing away as his grey tail tucked beneath him. His scruffy head, marked with a heavy black diamond, slouched close to the ground as his tongue lolled out- a desperate pant on his lips. 

It wasn’t from running. 

It was the sickening feeling of being so close to what could so easily be their… extinction? It wasn’t a word he was familiar with. Something he didn’t want to entertain. 

It brought images, lonely and cold, of his pack felled again. 

No longer fizzling, yet certainly still pained by the blisters wound, Kouga turned a urinated heavily upon a tree- marking the area. He didn’t want anyone, child or elder, to come upon this place heading no cation. He- couldn’t handle that devastation. And the moral of the pack was already faded as it was. 

His people wanted to head Southward and away from his Eastern Mountains to that of Ayame’s grounds, where he had just arrived from.

Far from the ancestral hunt- the endless lands in which held eons worth of paw steps. Where his mother and father hunted before him- where he had wanted his own pups to hunt. 

It was a kind of selfishness that caused a continuous hailing of guilt. A fearless leader didn’t endanger his pack. A true leader would give himself for the wellness of his people. 

_Just one more year-!_

Kouga’s path resumed, albeit slower. His heart muddled and bruised while his face retained a striking look of fierceness. He wouldn’t let his- couldn’t let his fear crush him. 

Kagome was at camp. And he at least wanted to see her before Inuyasha came in screaming and disturb what little structure they maintained. 

The rest of the way was manageable, his speed slowed so he would not reopen leak a trail all the way back to the dens. Yet, even then his skin was barely lacing together. The thin strips of meat barely holding themselves over his ribs. 

Fumino would snip at his ears and cheeks, but he knew the old dam would patch him up. _How could you let them get so close?_

What would he answer? He couldn’t answer that. That his ability to kill humans had faded the day he met Kagome? That every time he killed a human, he knew just how close he had been to killing her? 

Or, perhaps, he would tell her he dreamed of a soft human body and beautiful blue eyes, deeper than the oceans themselves? 

Kagome had chosen Inuyasha and he hadn’t been sad about it. He had been _crushed_. 

But, oh gods, he wanted her to be happy. That’s all he ever wanted. 

Kouga stepped into camp with little fanfare. The sun was blazing far overhead and wolves were naturally nocturnal; meaning many were tucked away in their dens or stretching out on flat rocks under the shade of ancient conifers. 

His heart twitched in his chest, the smell of family and brethren forcing his wild soul into a lull-

Just for a second. 

Underneath the smell of nettles and lichen, was a scent burned into his nose from his years of seeking her out. Her blood smelling rich and unwelcome amongst the packed soil and sun-tanned pelts. 

Bones turned and moved beneath his skin, a snarl coaxing its way out of his drying throat as he forced himself into his human skin. It itched where his fur once covered and it felt unnatural to walk on two legs- his heart crying out for his true form just as he stood firm in his human one. 

How strange was it that he, a wolf, would walk like a man?

It made it easier, sure- you could blend in quickly and enter small areas. The trees didn’t catch your shoulders and your fur didn’t mat…

But each day, his hands mocked him. His legs, free of jewel shards, did not run as fast anymore. The loping gait of his run lost-

Ginta made it up beside him, panting heavily as he flopped to his belly- having run to find him and having to chase him _all the way back_. It was exhausting- but he was glad he didn’t leave it. Glad he made the journey for his packmates. 

Kouga knew that Ginta could sense his toiling emotions- they’d grown up together. Maybe a few springs between their births. They had been pups together, trapped in the forms that he yearned to take again. 

He remembered that one of Hakkaku’s ears drooped longer than his other one, giving his head an off-balanced look. Ginta had been taller than both of them for three summers until Kouga had burgeoned into a growth spurt neither of them had caught up to.

Except for maybe things revolving around Kagome. For the years she had been gone, then that year she had sent him an invitation to a ma-rr-ia-ge, a stupid term for taking a mate: he had been _ceremoniously cold._

Every day he locked away any little, teenie-tiny feeling he had revolving around her. He pretended she had never happened and only hoped that the dog would take care of her. 

But now...he could smell her blood. Her tears, her sweat, her hair, her skin, her-

Kouga walked slowly to Fumino’s den, ducking past the horsetails growing outside and peaking into the dark den. His pupils dilated against the sudden darkness and falling deftly to the ancient she-wolf leaning against the cave wall, perched like a gargoyle with her empty pipe clutched in her gnarled claw. 

Sliding away from the woman, her glaze hit down to the base of the tight cave- a fan of dark hair, iridescent like raven feathers, laid spread around a face that haunted him. 

He could smell the sedatives, the thick herbal concoction stinging the inside of his nose. The smell of blood, the smell of tears. 

A whine, something foreign and aching behind his breastbone, built. 

Yet he sat frozen for a second, arrows hanging out of him and a gaping wound over his left pec and collar bone. Naked in the sun until Ginta came up beside him, not sparing him a glance, as he entered. 

“Hey, Fumino-” Ginta made his way over to the woman, who’s second eyelids got stuck upon opening the first couple binks. “Couldja take this arrow out? I can’t reach it.”

And the spell was snapped. Kouga blinked and was able to drag his eyes away from her and to Fumino, who was dragging the tip of an arrow from the curve of Ginta’s shoulder blade. She was just finishing when she turned to look at Kouga-

The wrinkles of her face only proved to _increase_ the deathly snarl that coaxed the edges of her mouth and eyes. The purest look of rage-

Fumino snapped her way over to him, her still-deft fingertips feeling the edge of the wound, the blistered edge stinging as she assessed the damage. 

She didn’t speak as she quickly gathered things from around the den, each step making Kouga _hope_ that Kagome would wake up. Selfishly, of course, he wanted to see her as he remembered: fiery and impassioned. 

But as Fumino stomped back to him, lathering his chest with adipocere and carefully ground herbs, Kagome only proved to flutter her eyes, but not fully awaken. 

“Where’d this happen?” Her voice was gruff for more reasons than one. “Didja kill ‘em?”

The inflection of her voice proved that, despite her work, she was elated by the idea of the slaughter. To that, he simply nodded as she worked upon him. 

“Down alongside the edge, past the Lord’s house,” Kouga muttered as she pressed a thick cut of leather bandage to the raw flesh. _They were getting closer in._

It was left unsaid- they all knew that the humans were invading. Chipping in closer and closer, cutting down trees that had marked the ancestral paths for generations upon generations. Killing animals relentlessly- hunting what shouldn’t be hunted. 

Fumino looked him over again, pulling the arrows he’d forgotten about from his shoulders and twisting his free hair to the un-injured side. 

“What did the red wolf say?”

Kouga’s mood darkened. 

Ayame- No, Ayame and _her grandfather_ were hard to deal with. She was _insistent_ . Unmovable. And _her grandfather_ was so sure that _humans_ were so killable. 

Everyone was so sure it would be easy. 

Yet here he was. The sword hadn’t even _scraped_ him, the handle hitting him. Yet, it caused such destruction. 

Had it stabbed him, truly, he would have _died._ Died in a battle against a few humans. 

Almost, as if she were sad over this unspoken sentiment, Kagome began to whimper as the smell of tears filled the air. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I uploaded this chapter to the wrong fanfiction last night. :) 
> 
> Im in hell. 
> 
> Anyway- Crisis averted. 
> 
> I wanted to play around with Kouga and his emotions in this one. His lack of control, more likely. And I wanted to re-incorporate the manga/anime's surface view of his feelings of Kagome.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!
> 
> This was a bit of an experiment. For a novel I am writing I am trying to display certain levels of hopelessness and angst but also different ways people cope with certain tragedies. 
> 
> So, please review and if you have any feedback, I would appreciate it!


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